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The Japanese have an absolute plethora of onomatopoeia and ideophones, many of which have very little to do with actual sounds. Our students here at Genki may come already knowing some from manga or other Japanese media, but I thought I would post about some less commonly known ones we discussed in our class last week.

If you are ever needing medicine or to go to the clinic here in Japan, there 3 could be useful
Hiri Hiri means a stinging sunburn kind of hurt
chiku chiku is a pricking pain, both empty and keen
zuki zuki is a throbbing pain pulsing pain.

For those who have ever heard of the pokemon Pikachu, which I imagine must be most of the world by now, this one may be enlightening, Pika Pika means to shine.

If you are a fan of storms, zaa zaa is a pouring drenching rain, while para para, as it sounds, is a much softer rain, a pitter patter if you will. Potsu potsu is a rain that falls intermittently, at times stopping. As far as thunder goes, goro goro means to roll, and is often used for a rolling thunder. (Or to mean you lazed about all day.) Don Don is, as it sounds when pronounced with a Japanese intonation, is a loud booming thunder. Gata Gata is the kind of loud thunderous noise that is reminiscent of earthquakes, a sound Japanese are familiar with.


Some other onomatopoeia you may hear commonly or already know are...
Jiro Jiro-to stare
Peco Peco- to be hungry
Pera Pera- to be adept or skilled at, most often applied to language and fluency.

Fly an Octopus, Go Fry a Kite



The issue many non-native Asian speakers of English have with pronouncing the L and R sounds found in many western languages are well known and frequently the subject of comics’ and their audience’s amusement. Two of the most famously difficult to pronounce words for Asian non-native speakers are “fly” and “fry.” In a fantastic twist of irony, I learned in class today that at least one of the words for fly and fry are exactly the same. Not only do they have the pronunciation, but the kanji as well is exactly the same. Ageru （揚げる）means both to fly (in the sense of flying a flag or a kite) and to fry in oil. In a wonderful twist of fate, the example given was a different homonym, tako, meaning both octopus and kite. Consequently, the sentence たこをあげて！Could mean not only, “Go fly a kite!” or “Fry an octopus!” but also “Fry a kite!” and “Fly an Octopus!” I personally find the last the most amusing option. Perhaps this explains a bit why Japanese English learners are so often confused by fly and fry. ; ) I know for a fact that there are many Japanese homonyms we Japanese learners struggle to master. (ie. The pronunciation of hasshi and hasshi)

Here are some pictures of flying octopus to stare at as you ponder the intricacies of human language.

Here's a great website with information about some of the huge variety of different ghosts and monsters in traditional Japanese mythology, all explained in English with lovely illustrations:
The Obakemono Project

"Obakemono" (お化け物) is the honorific "o" plus "bake" (to change or corrupt) and "mono" (thing). Some of the monsters from traditional tales are more humorous than scary-seeming, but this site is a great resource for those of you interested in the mythology!

日本の「すごい」こと
We asked our students to “share what you think is great about Japan with everyone else!” Here’s what we got:

1. Traffic lights with jingles (Many pedestrian crossings in Japan play music when you can walk. In Fukuoka, there are two songs played at each intersection, so blind people can tell which direction is currently safe to cross. One is toryanse, a traditional Japanese song, while the other is Comin’ Through the Rye, by Robert Burns!)
2. Dessert Viking (In Japan, “Viking” means “all-you-can-eat”. Quite a few restaurants and hotels around the city offer fixed-price dessert buffets, with a wide range of different desserts and usually free drinks. A great way to fatten up!)
3. Super-huge ice cream jugs
4. Trains on time
5. “Sumimasen” (People say “sumimasen” a lot in Japan. Really, a lot.)
6. イケメン (“ikemen”, or handsome Japanese guys)
7. Convenience stores
8. たべ/のみほうだい (“tabe/nomihoudai”, all you can eat and drink. A popular choice for GenkiJACS parties, as everyone pays the same, so billing is easy. Usually for a set duration, for example 2 hours)
9. Ryokan / おんせん (“onsen”, hot springs. “Ryokan” are traditional Japanese inns, a great way to spend a night, and usually not too expensive. Here’s a recommended ryokan in Fukuoka!)
10. Sushi
11. Free tissues (Many companies hand out tissues on the street to advertise themselves.)
12. Yuji-sensei (of course!)
13. Mandarake!!!!!!!!!! (A giant manga and collector shop near GenkiJACS in Fukuoka)
14. Obasans with pink, blue, purple and yellow hair! (“Obasan” means old lady. A lot of older women dye their hair less-conventional colors, for presently unknown reasons)
15. Dialects / Hakata-ben (The local dialect of Japanese is quite a famous one in Japan, and people from other regions often say that it sounds cute.)
16. けいご (“keigo”, or polite Japanese)
17. Crepes (Japan has some really great crepe shops, for some reason.)
18. Engrish
19. Hawks! (the local baseball team!)
20. Nice people
21. Game Centers!! (Round 1, a couple of hundred meters from school, has all the entertainment you could ever want! Batting cages, bowling, automatic table tennis machines, a free-play arcade, karaoke and much much more!)
22. Gundam
23. Purikura (“print club”, instant photo machines designed for group photos)
24. Mika-sensei

One of my favourite aspects of the language is 四字熟語 ("yojijukugo", 4-character idioms). Literally, it means:
yo(yon) = 四 = four
ji = 字 = character
jukugo = 熟語 = phrase
These four character kanji compounds can be used in all sorts of situations and are a very convenient way on conveying a complex concept simply and quickly. Many yojijukugo have an idiomatic meaning that can't be easily determined just by looking at the characters, although some are quite easy to understand. Becoming a master at using yojijukugo will take a lot of practice. But here are a few of the more common ones to memorize. Break these out in conversation with your friends and watch their jaws drop!

1. 弱肉強食 ("Jakunikukyoushoku")
Character meanings: weak/meat/strong/eat
English idiom: Law of the jungle (literally, the weak are meat for the strong to eat)

2. 一石二鳥 ("Issekinichou")
Character meanings: one/stone/two/bird
English idiom: Kill two birds with one stone

3. 一期一会 ("Ichigoichie")
Character meanings: one/period/one/meeting
English idiom: Once in a lifetime

4. 自画自賛 ("Jigaijisan")
Character meanings: self/painting/self/praise
English idiom: Blowing one's own horn

As always, there's a lot more info about these, with examples, at Wikipedia.

The Japanese love to talk about the weather. I suppose when you have a country with such a diverse climate it’s hard not to. The beaches in Okinawa rival any tropical paradise, and snowy Hokkaido is a Mecca for skiers and snowboarders from around the world.
The seasons are very clearly separated in Japan. The Japanese are very proud of this fact and often ask foreigners whether they have 四季 (shiki, four seasons) in their own countries. In Fukuoka, winters (冬, fuyu) are generally mild with snow falling maybe once or twice a year. Spring (春, haru) is a great time of year to visit as the temperatures get warmer and the 桜 (sakura, cherry blossom) start to bloom. Then, the 梅雨 (tsuyu, rainy season) hits in late May/early June bringing a month of rain and sweat. Summers (夏, natsu) are hot with high humidity and air-conditioning is a must! Finally, autumn (秋, aki), with it’s 紅葉 (kouyou, leaves changing colour), is a great time to experience outdoor Japan.

The continually changing seasons are always a topic of conversation. When writing letters, it is standard practice to add a weather-related comment at the very beginning of the letter, even if it’s an impersonal mass mailing from a company to its customers! The Japanese version of Microsoft Word has a function to automatically insert the relevant phrase, by just selecting the season and the current weather:


This inserts a super-polite phrase like this one into your document:
菊花の候、貴社ますますご盛栄のこととお喜び申し上げます。平素は格別のご高配を賜り、厚くお礼申し上げます。

Having recently come back to Japan from a trip to the UK, I was barraged with the usual questions about my home country. The first of which wasn’t “Did you have a good time?” or “Where did you visit?” but always, “Was the weather cold?”!!

The Japanese language has only 101 different possible sounds in its syllabary, which means there are a lot of words that end up sounding the same! This often confounds new students of Japanese, who have difficulties telling the difference between words such as 橋 (hashi, meaning bridge) and 箸 (hashi, meaning chopsticks). We're often asked which words have the most meanings (or, more accurately, which sounds have the most words corresponding to them). So, without further ado, here is a list of the top ten most common word-sounds in Japanese:

10: しょうし (shoushi, 31 words)
9: こうそう (kousou, 32 words)
8: せいし (seishi, 33 words)
6 (tie): しょうか (shouka, 34 words)
6 (tie): きこう (kikou, 34 words)
5: しこう (shikou, 36 words)
4: こうか (kouka, 39 words)
3: こうこう (koukou, 42 words)
2: こうし (koushi, 44 words)
1: こうしょう (koushou, 47 words)

Of course, it's usually quite easy to figure out which of the meanings a person intends to use, based on the context.
The astute reader will notice that 8 of the 10 sounds above contain the component 'kou'. This is because there are a huge number of kanji that can be read as 'kou'. Jim Breen's always useful online Japanese dictionary finds all of 303 different kanji characters read as "kou"! Nobody said it was an easy language to read and write!

Just a quick post on the different priorities of cooks in Japan:



This microwave has 2 buttons. The first is labelled あたためる (atatameru, to warm), with a picture of a bowl of rice. The lower one is labelled 生ものの解凍 (namamono no kaitou, or defrosting raw things). Look closely at the picture, though. That's right, the one thing they decided to use to represent all possible raw foods was: a squid!

No streetlights? No problem. Vending machines will light your way...



Stretching as far as the eye can see! In Japanese, vending machine is 自動販売機 which is another great example of kanji that can be understood even if you don't know how to say them. To break it down:
自: ji, meaning onself
動: dou, meaning to move
自動: jidou: to move by oneself - hence, automatic!
販: han, meaning marketing
売: bai, meaning to sell
販売: meaning sales
機: ki, meaning machine

So, a 自動販売機 is an automatic sales machine! There, wasn't that easy?

Many many moons ago, we had a "discussion" with a native speaker of English who was upset that the Japanese mangle the pronunciation of "coffee" as 「コーヒー」, among many other words. However, we pointed out that coffee isn't an English word in the first place. This source traces it from the Arabic qahwah. This is one example of a word whose pronunciation in English is at least as bad as the katakana version of that same word.
As Japanese has such a limited syllabary, it's inevitable that some words can't be faithfully transliterated into Japanese, one of the most famous being McDonalds, or マクドナルド (makudonarudo) as it's known here. However, in many cases Japanese does a much better job of keeping words imported from other languages close to the root word than English! Partly this is because those words were imported into Japanese much more recently, meaning there has been less time for the pronunciation to be corrupted. But partly it's also because effort is made to represent the sound as faithfully as possible, unlike the common habit in English of anglicizing words. This is very obvious in place names.
So, for example, the country we call Switzerland is called 「スイス」 (Suisu) in Japanese, which is much closer to the original Suisse. Likewise, the recent Steven Spielberg film about the Munich Olympics scandal was called 「ミュンヘン」 (Myunhen) in Japan. Paris becomes パリ (Pari), and Germany ドイツ (Doitsu), Italy is イタリア (Itaria) and Turkey トルコ (Toruko). Interestingly, Spain stays as スペイン (Supein), for some reason, and Sweden is スウェーデン (Sueeden) rather than Suverijji.